Just the Sound of Your Heart In Your Head
by darthsydious
Summary: Darcy has a nightmare and Phil is there to take care of her. Kid!Darcy, can be seen as a companion to "Take a Sad Song and Make It Better"


_Lyrics taken from "Quiet" from Matilda the Musical, which also served as the inspiration for this fic. I love the idea of Darcy as a kid being like Matilda in that she's smart, she loves to read. Lyrics are in italics in-between paragraphs. Enjoy! - darthsydious_

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Darcy was having a nightmare. She thrashed against her sheets, feeling as though they were someone's arms, holding her down, keeping her from escaping. They would hit her. Rick hit her. Her mother did when she was drunk sometimes, not hard, but Darcy still didn't like it. In her nightmare she could hear pounding feet, someone was chasing her. She was back in her old house, back in Nebraska. She ran down the dark hallway, trying to reach her room. Desperate to get there. In her room she was safe. It was quiet, it was dark. It had all her school books and her cello and the pictures she tore out of old magazines. Behind her there was shouting, everyone was always shouting. Her mother and Rick always yelled and cursed, especially when they drank. Darcy wished they would stop, she wanted it all to stop for once. She put her hands over her ears, crying. The walls seemed to close around her, voices growing louder and louder. Everything began to spin, her cello seemed to dance out of her grasp, her books all flying apart. The world was chaos, and she felt numbly that it was her world. The only world she ever knew and would only know. Amid all the flurry she could still see the hallway to her room, standing still in all the noise and confusion was a man in a dark suit, hands in his pockets.

"Darcy," he said. "Darcy calm down,"

"I'm sorry!" she sobbed "I'm not explaining it right," she grew angry at the noise, at the harsh light in her eyes, at the smell of beer and cigarettes and her mother shouting and Rick raising his hand to slap her. Darcy's eyes burned, she scrabbled for purchase as she felt herself tumbling down and down, head over heels when suddenly-

_This noise becomes anger, and the anger is light,_

_And its burning inside me would usually fade,_

_But it isn't today, and the heat and the shouting,_

_And my heart is pounding, and my eyes are burning,_

_And suddenly everything, everything is..._

A hand reached for her's, and suddenly she was awake. The images in her head seemed to all fall away. The books fell away to the floor, her cello drifted back onto its stand. Her mother was gone, and so was Rick. The air was clean and clear, she could only hear the noise of the clock on the wall just outside her room.

_Quiet..._

She let out a gasping breath, feeling tears slide down her cheeks. Still. The world was still again. Phil held her hand, soothing her. He cupped her cheek, wiping her eyes.

_Like silence, but not really silent..._

_Just that still sort of quiet_

"You were having a bad dream," he said softly. She could only nod, trying to catch her breath. He watched her, trying to discern what she would do next. Would she cry? No. She let him wipe her eyes, and no more tears fell. He studied her face, realizing she didn't seem upset as most children are when they wake from a nightmare. She shut her eyes, listening. Her face turned toward the door where she could hear the clock.

_Like the sound of a page being turned in a book,_

_Or a pause in a walk in the woods._

Darcy was relieved. This peace was so rare to her. The stillness of a room, of the freedom to leave your door open and not worry if someone or something would crash through it. She wanted Phil to understand her, understand that she was happy here. Darcy didn't know how to put into words how much she loved living here in New York with him. For a city everyone said was dangerous, she felt safest in it.

_Quiet..._

_Like silence, but not really silent..._

_Just that nice kind of quiet,_

_Like the sound when you lie upside down in your bed._

_Just the sound of your heart in your head..._

Phil shifted so he could sit upright on her bed, his back against the wall. She crawled into his lap as soon as he was settled; she rested her head against his chest, listening to his heartbeat matching hers.

"Do you want me to comb your hair?" he asked, knowing this action soothed her. She nodded against him and his fingers began brushing against her scalp. She shut her eyes, sighing deeply. She could smell the fabric softener on his shirt. Clean clothes, that too was a revelation for her. She knew how to do some washing, but it's hard to take care of laundry when you're only eight and your mom likes to put things in the washer when she's drunk. In Phil's apartment, they did laundry on Saturday night. They'd get pizza and sit in the laundry room while they waited for their things to dry.

"Do you want to talk about your dream?" Darcy heard him ask.

"It wasn't a dream," she said. "It was a nightmare." Her arms wrapped around his middle, she cuddled closer to him, curling her legs up. "Sometimes I think this is a dream, and I'm afraid I'll wake up and I won't be home anymore." Her voice sounded choked at the end, the very idea of this wonderful simplicity being snatched from her, something so wonderful that she might only have imagined it. She could see herself back in Nebraska, reheating flash-frozen dinner and listening as Rick threw a can of beer at the wall. The lamp smashing and her mother yelling back at him. Dirt and filth everywhere, the sink overflowing with dishes and Darcy in the middle of it all, desperately trying to believe she could ever get away from it.

_And though the people around me,_

_Their mouths are still moving,_

_The words they are forming_

_Cannot reach me anymore._

Phil kissed her forehead.

"It's not a dream," he said quietly. "This is home now, I'm your home, and you are never going back there, okay?" her grip on him tightened.

"Tell me a story," she said quietly, "Just until I go to sleep," he hummed in response, reaching for the bedside lamp. Next to it was a library copy of _The Hobbit_.

"From the beginning?" he asked

"No, I was at the part with the barrels," she found the page she marked with a piece of paper. "There," She crawled off his lap, instead leaning against him, his arm over her shoulder as he continued to comb her head.

"_In despair and not knowing what else to do, poor little Bilbo caught hold of it and was pushed over the edge with it-" _Phil reading always put her to sleep. It was one of the many things she liked best in the world (she had so many favorites). Reading wasn't just a routine, it was time spent together, it was peace and quiet. Together they read about the Hobbit escaping with the dwarves, down the river in barrels. Before long, Darcy was yawning, and in a little while Phil could see her head nodding. Shutting the book, he carefully eased her back under the covers, tucking her in.

"Goodnight Phil," she murmured, and he smiled a little, bending to kiss her forehead.

"Goodnight Darcy." The lamp was shut off with a click, and he left her room, the door kept open so she could hear the clock on the wall. With a comfortable sigh, she slipped away from consciousness, content in her quiet.

_And it is quiet..._

_And I am warm..._

_Like I've sailed_

_Into the eye of the storm..._


End file.
